Dan is determined to figure out how to crack my Patriarch and after our last few games he certainly seems to have found a tactic that can work. He blasts it with his heavy weapons on approach and then hopes that either his Brotherhood Champions initial melee attacks or Heroic Sacrifice will finish the job. It certainly worked in 2 of the 3 games we played last weekend. I think if I’m a little smarter with model placement I’ll have a better opportunity to use Look Out Sir!

We’re playing through the campaign, but aren’t tracking model advancements, just the impact the games have on Resources. The games are proving fun so far, even if the Patriarch is a tough nut to crack.

This is the seventh game of the campaign and this time we played one of the narrative play missions from the Sector Munitorum boxed set. The mission was called Stowaway and in it Phil’s Genestealer Cult needed to sneak into Munitorum containers. My models started as sentries and couldn’t react or move on the first turn. In order to enter a container Phil’s models needed to be close to it at the start of a round, do nothing for the whole round and there couldn’t be any of my models within 4″. Each container could only be entered once. He’d score one VP per stowaway and I’d get 1 VP per kill.

Phil’s cult ambush moves were particularly successful and he was able to get three models near containers and get them stowed away at the end of the first round. Things became messier as he charged models to engage some of my force while trying to position other models to stowaway.

In the third round things were 4:4 with only one Ultramarine and one Genestealer left alive/on the board. Phil could have run and then hoped I couldn’t get within 4″ of the ‘stealer by the next turn, but that didn’t seem like much of a plan. He decided to charge, but the flesh-wounded Genestealer was unlucky and one of my overwatch bolts struck home, taking it out.

This close game ended 5:4. Phil chose this scenario to attack my Morale, which was down at 4. Losing would have taken 2 off of that! Thankfully a win meant it wasn’t impacted and my Materiel increased to 9.

Last weekend Dan and I got our first few games of Commanders. I used the Patriarch (Lvl1: Fortitude) and he had the Brotherhood Champion (Lvl1: Strength or Psychic) and the games were fast and brutal. Normally we try to play 2 games of Kill Team in an evening, we played four on Saturday night. We played the first three Matched Play missions for Commanders: A Meeting of Fates (P.114), Comms Down (P.115) and Hold the Line (P.116). The first two have very Commander-focussed victory conditions and they forced the Commanders into Close proximity to each other. Dan won the first game, but then the Patriarch really shined. I think squishy Commanders might really struggle in at least those first two missions.

At 131 points (of 200) the Patriarch seems expensive, but his cost is offset by the cheap models you can surround him with. Purestrain Genestealers are only 11pts and there are other cheaper options for objective grabbing. So, it’s still possible to build a decent sized team. Things are not so for the Grey Knight. All of their models are expensive and in order to include a 108pt Commander they typically need to lose another model.

Dan and I will get more games played later and we’ll see how our Commanders fare. They’ve dominated the games we’ve played so far, but that is to be expected: they’re a lot of points, they are new shiny toys and the missions objectives so far have featured them strongly.

I think they’re another tool in the tabletop storytelling toolkit. I look forward to integrating them into campaigns.

A couple of weeks ago Dan and I played two games of Kill Team, but rather than using the standard board and terrain, we decided to use the Space Hulk tiles. For this game we adopted the Kill Team: Rogue Trader close fighting rules, with two simple amendments: i) friendly models can move through each other if they have sufficient movement to do so and ii) models cannot draw LoS through other models in single width corridors.

These simple rules resulted in two tense and exciting games. It meant my Genestealers could often charge from behind cover, with Dan only able to use the ‘Point-blank Overwatch’ tactic once per turn. This would seem to advantage the Genestealers, but as they weren’t able to concentrate multiple chargers on a single model (because of the narrow corridors) it evened out.

If you fancy a claustrophobic and tense game I recommend giving it a go!

I’m not sure if you played the childhood game of ‘Bulldog’ (seemingly also know as ‘British Bulldog‘). Basically one team formed a line with hands linked and challenged a runner from the other team to breakthrough. That’s what the Terror Tactics mission in Kill Team is like.

My Deathwatch team lined up and the Genestealer Cult ran at them. This was a fun and tight game, I managed to take out 6 of Phil’s 9 team members, netting me 6 VPs, but he managed to get 3 off and kill 2 of my team, scoring 8 VPs for him.

There were some great moments in the game. I enjoyed seeing my Frag Cannon and Infernus Heavy Bolter opening up on a cluster of acolytes and neophytes, causing carnage. Watching Phil’s leader charge into my line to force me to kill him was also pretty noteworthy. He didn’t have enough distance to go for an advance off the board, so he decided to charge one of my models. This was because I had a model trying to make a 2 VP run off of his board edge, so the sooner Phil could cause the game to end the better as he had already netted his VPs.

It was a fun game, but things are starting to look a little dicey for me in the campaign! My Morale is down to 4, so it won’t take too much more to finish it off. Phil’s Materiel is down to 5, so I’ll need to attack it next.

Campaign Overview

This campaign comprises two games: a 100pt game of Kill Team and a 1000pt game of Warhammer 40,000. The first game can be played with any appropriate Kill Team mission (we chose Recover Intelligence). The winner of the Kill Team game may veto 1 card from the Open War draw (e.g. Deployment, Objective or Twist).

Playing the Campaign

Game 1: John opted to use Death Guard and I brought my Blood Angels out to play. As I was using Primaris models it meant my Kill Team was a little vanilla (I’m getting my excuses in early…), with 6 Intercessors. John’s was more varied with 4 Plague Marines and 4 Pox Walkers, the Plague Marines being armed with a blight launcher, a bubonic axe, a power fist and a standard load out. That’s why my marines looked so vanilla – they had Bolt Rifles and their puny fists! We had a fun game – it was John’s first go at Kill Team and I think he liked it. Here are some photos from the game:

In summary – my shots bounced off of John’s Plague Marines while he easily outscored me on VPs!

Game 2: On to the main course. Here are the Open War cards we ended up with for our game of 40k:

John vetoed the first Twist card we drew (which allowed one force to deploy first, but pretty much guarantee going first) and we ended up with Grudge Match, which resulted in a pretty epic and bloody game.

I decided to have a Primaris Chaplain lead the force as I recently painted him and it fit the fluff (the Blood Angels trying to resist the Blood Rage caused by the Sanguous Flux). Joining him were 3 units of Intercessors, a unit of Hellblasters, a Lieutenant, a Predator and a Redemptor Dreadnaught.

John opted for a Daemon Prince of Nurgle [8 PL, 156pts]: Hellforged sword, Warlord, 2 units of Plague Marines, 3 Myphitic Blight-haulers (which really scared me!) and a Plagueburst Crawler. I had no idea what his force could do, but I was about to find out in a tight and hard fought game…

Deployment

We used a 4′ x 4′ board as with only 1000pts it would give plenty of room. The objectives hadn’t been placed when I took the photo, but I place 3 close the the right hand side and John distributed his quite evenly along the back line. I won’t detail everything that happened in the battle, but John’s force advanced on two fronts, while the Plagueburst Crawler hung back – the Blight-haulers and a unit of Plague Marines moved up in front of the Predator and the other unit of Plague Marines, with a somewhat cautious (initially!) Daemon Prince moved towards the Redemptor.

I focussed heavily on trying to take down the Blight-haulers and this eventually paid dividends with the Chaplain landing the killing blow. This took a lot of effort and saw the Hellblasters reduced to one marine and the Predator was taken out too!

Much of my other shooting had proven ineffective, until, for some unknown reason, it just lit up… severely mauling the two units of Plague Marines. Things weren’t looking too bad at this point as I still had some units in play and John was more-or-less reduced to the Daemon Prince and Plagueburst Crawler.

The Daemon Prince came out to play… he took out the Chaplain in a single Curse of the Leper (Yup, rolling five 5+ on seven dice!).

The Daemon Prince was within striking distance of my objectives (he could Burn and Pillage one at the end of each turn). My troops on the left flank were already high-tailing it towards John’s objectives, leaving the Redemptor to try to slow John’s Warlord.

Alas, I couldn’t quite slow him enough and John managed to remove my final objective about a turn before I would have gotten to his last one. It was an exceptionally close game in the end!

The gunship’s engines screamed as the Administratum sector of Benus Majoris came into view. The enemy had not set foot in this area yet, but even at this altitude the devastation wrought by weeks of bombardments was clear to see. From orbit the line of conflict scaring the planet was a deep grey-black wall of smoke signifying the advance across its surface. Up close, things were becoming sharper – the detail of the destruction, the Imperium’s facilities in ruin, was clear to behold. The planet’s air started to filter through the scrubbers. It carried the scent of war, a scant few parts per million, but Amareus could taste it. Blood. He turned to survey his brothers and it was clear from the look of predation that showed on their angelic faces that they could taste it too.

Sergeant Amareus retook his seat with his squad and the restraints automatically closed around his armour. He was the image of his father, their father. All Blood Angels shared in Sanguinus’ perfection – his grace, his artistry, his elevated mind… his doubt. Amareus wondered if doubt was as much a part of their heritage as their perfection. Was it necessary to sustain that perfection. He and his brothers had first seen action in the defence of Baal, arriving to fend off the last of the Tyranid horde and instigating some of the repairs. Amareus would live far longer than an unaltered human, but he doubted he’d see even a fraction of those repairs completed. Their home world, it still seemed strange to think of it as such, had been thoroughly devastated. Doubt… did all of his brothers share it or just Primaris like him. They were new, refined, different. Benus Majoris would be their first chance to prove themselves beyond the guiding hand of their more ancient brothers.

The tenor of the engines shifted… they would be on the surface in minutes.

I’ll be using an all Primaris force of Blood Angels in this two-game campaign. The first game (using 100pt Kill Team forces) will see Sergeant Amareus’ squad of Intercessors attempt to seize key intelligence from Administratum buildings. Lead scouting elements of the Death Guard force will oppose them as they attempt to secure more ground ahead of their advancing armies.

Again the random generators are useful for developing the character of the force:

Scouting Mission: These battle-brothers must slip deep behind enemy lines and banish the shadows of ignorance with the Emperor’s inescapable light.

Infiltration Specialists: These warriors slip through the enemy lines like a dagger through the ribs.

Fresh Meat: Fresh from their first drop and ready to serve the Emperor, how will these Primaris perform? (Modified from the Astra Militarum Background generator)

I need to figure out specifically which mission we’ll play in Kill Team, but I’m leaning towards ‘Recover Intelligence’ – it’s a nicely mission that forces movement and strategic decisions to be made. I need to think about the 40k mission and the benefit, if any, winning the Kill Team game will to the victor…

Pride blossomed in Suppurax Grulgus’ chest as he surveyed his warriors marching through their conquests and the ruins they had once called home. The 5th Plague Company had fought bravely and efficiently, but the resistance had been scant. He closed his eyes. Smoke, half-clotted blood, ruination, rot… he was surrounded by the aromas of war. Suppurax breathed it in deep, feeling the heady smells suffuse his being, igniting his senses. War was how he honoured the Daemon Prince Coagulax, blood was his offering. He loved the coppery tang of the blood. He loved the corruption in the air. He opened his eyes again and looked across the agonised faces of the conquests. They were innumerable. Poles with impaled conquests, often two or three of them, covered every patch of open ground for as far as he could see. Blood oozed from their still-living bodies, while their faces writhed in silent agony. The Sanguous Flux will hold them in this state for centuries, their unclotted blood seeping into the ground, turning into another fertile garden for his beloved Nurgle. The ground sloshed a brownish red as Suppurax moved to rejoin his warriors. He didn’t even know the name of this world the Imperium had no doubt once been so proud of. It will be Nurgle’s soon.

John and I will be playing a simple Kill Team/40k campaign on Sunday. This is a little bit of background story to introduce the army he’ll be playing.

One of the nice things about Kill Team are the random background, mission and squad quirk generators. They can offer inspiration. For John’s army I’ve gone with:

Virulent: These warriors are infected with the very foulest of Nurgle’s contagions (i.e. the Sanguous Flux), and have devoted themselves to spreading them far and wide.

Seize and Profane: A vital location (i.e. the administrative sector of Benus Majoris as it represents the Imperium’s control) or enemy asset must first be captured, and then utterly desecrated with filth.

Justifiable Arrogance: Revoltingly proud of their Legion, these traitors are determined to uphold its reputation as the galaxy’s most unyielding martial force.

These are simple narrative cues, but they can really bring a force and its interaction with a setting alive.

This was myself and Gav’s first game of Season 4 and from our perspective the changes were mostly just streamlining the game. We didn’t play with the Game Plan cards (as we don’t have them yet), but other than that we played using the Season 4 rules. I prefer the AoE and ball placement rules – placing a template centred over the end of a measured distance was a little clunky in such a precise game.

I (using the Union) kicked using Mist and his superb mobility allowed me to mess up the Farmer’s plan with the ball. The result was much of the game was played in their half as they scrambled to deal with my pretty kill team. I missed a goal shot with Mist, but from then on things went my way. Blackheart was a powerhouse, but all of the players did their part. I managed 4 take downs and a Decimate goal to the Farmer’s single mascot take down. The tweets below give a reasonably good overview of the game.

I’ve been doing quite a bit of painting this year, but I have been quite remiss in blogging about it. I keep a painting tracker going on the blog (right hand side on desktop devices).

This guy is going to join both my Blood Angels and my Deathwatch Kill Team. I already have a DW Kill Team based on the Overkill models, but I want to do some Primaris, based on conversions of the Conquest magazine models.

Anyway, just a quick update to say that just because I’m not posting about painting doesn’t mean I’m not doing some!